Electrical connectors comprising an insulating body having electrical contacts carried thereby are well known in the art. In the so-called male connectors, the insulating body carries pin-like contacts which extend above and below the insulating body to facilitate electrical connection from one element, such as a printed circuit board, to another element which may, for example, comprise a so-called female connector. As is well known, a female connector comprises an insulating body which carries an electrical contact which is generally capable of receiving at one end thereof a male pin, and at the other end thereof an electrical conductor which may be another male pin, a single electrical conductor, or a single strand of a multiconductor flat ribbon cable. Typically, the aforedescribed male connector and female connector are utilized in a tandem or interrelated fashion to provide electrical connection from one element such as the printed circuit paths on a printed circuit board to individual conductors or the multiple conductors of multiconductor ribbon cable.
The aforedescribed male and female type connectors are generally manufactured with a predetermined number of contacts carried thereby. For example, a typical male connector of the type described above might comprise a length of insulating material having ten, twenty, thirty, or any number of pins carried thereby. Similarly, a female connector may comprise a body of insulating material having individual cavities disposed therein, each cavity of which carries an electrical contact. Like the male connectors, the female connectors are commonly manufactured with ten, twenty, thirty, etc., contacts.
There are several drawbacks associated with the manufacture and use of both male and female connectors of the type described above. First, since the end user may not necessarily know or be able to anticipate the number of contacts he will ultimately require in a given situation, he must purchase an inventory of a variety of different size connectors, i.e., he must maintain a supply of ten-contact connectors, twenty-contact connectors, thirty-contact connectors, etc. Secondly, to the extent that a given electrical application only requires two electrical contacts to provide conduction between say two printed circuit paths on a printed circuit board and two electrical conductors, he is paying for but not using approximately 80% of the ten-contact connector. Likewise, if the given electrical application requires only 13 contacts, he has paid for but is not utilizing 7/20 of a twenty-contact connector.